We drove 900 miles from Miami to get to New Orleans by May 19th for the Starting Bloc Institute for Social Innovation. The institute brings together fellows from all over the world for a series of workshops and activities designed to inspire, instruct, and stretch our limits.We had the wonderful opportunity to attend the institute thanks to Starting Bloc for a partial scholarship, 54 generous donors who helped us raise $2,240 to cover the rest of our tuition and transportation, and to Danielle Dirks and Caroline Heldman for hosting us in Orlando (on the way) and in New Orleans.

The Tuscans have the faculty of making much of common things and converting small occasions into great pleasures.

-Henry James-

With this post, we invite you along with us to explore the idyllic Tuscan seaside area of Marina di Pietrasanta. Here, there are summer months of long days spent bronzing in the golden sun, playing in the soft sand, and cooling off in the salty Mediterranean. Life has a slower pace, a savory taste of fresh food and freedom from all external constraint.

We ( Nastassja Schmiedt & Lea Roth ) are knowmads who work locally & globally online through our social enterprise timetospringup.org. We’d been based in Miami for a while, and just published our first book ( Millennial Sex ) in August, so when we were invited to travel with Nastassja’s dad to Tuscany to spend September with their family there, we were super excited! With this post, we invite you to come along with us…